Friday, September 21, 2012

Player Profile: Jeff Banister

I have one card of Jeff Banister, from 1992 Topps Debut.

Playing career: Jeff Banister played in one game for the Pirates in 1991 and got an infield single in his only major league at-bat.

Where he is now: He has spent his entire career in the Pirates organization, and is now the team’s bench coach. Here is an interesting interview about how he prepares to manage in case manager Clint Hurdle is ejected.

Interesting facts: Banister had to overcome an unusual amount of adversity just to make it to professional baseball. In his junior year of high school he was diagnosed with bone cancer and almost lost his right leg, which was saved only after seven operations. In college he broke his neck in a collision at home plate, and was paralyzed for ten days, and needed to re-learn how to walk. After recovering from these, his father, grandfather and doctor all died within a three-week stretch.

My memories: Only know him from his card.

Google Autocomplete results: He is tenth when you type Jeff Ban, after Jeff Bandar, a chemistry graduate student at Columbia University. Another prominent Jeff Banister is an Assistant Research Social Scientist at the University of Arizona.

Coming up next: The next profile will be Scott Bankhead.

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